


Without Monument

by gaylabinsky



Category: The Iliad - Homer, The Song of Achilles - Madeline Miller
Genre: (everybody lives as in pat and achilles and bri live), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Everybody Lives, Explicit Sexual Content, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Reincarnation, Resurrection
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-17
Updated: 2017-01-01
Packaged: 2018-07-24 14:50:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 13,593
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7512403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gaylabinsky/pseuds/gaylabinsky
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>And now Akhilleus gave a dreadful cry.</i> (xviii.38)</p>
<p>In which the gods hear Achilles' cries of mourning and Patroclus is returned to him. Fates remain and the war is still won, but burdens of the once-dead weigh heavy on those still living.</p>
<p>(Title taken from Alexander the Great- "Bury my body and don't build any monument.")</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so i've been wanting to write this for well over a year and i've been writing it in clips and snippets and i've made drafts and every time i waited too long and ao3 deleted them so none of it really counts. i'm writing it now tho. i hope this lasts. currently i have an outline i'm following which is really just me rambling in bullet point form. one of those bullet points is literally just "#ovidfucker69" so we'll see how this goes.
> 
> there will be fluff but everyone is also gonna suffer™.

Achilles had loved him in his movements, a broken elegance he wished to hold, protect him from what had hurt him this way. He had loved him in the dark brown of his eyes, large and round, watching and filled with warmth, taking all in. He had loved him in the warmth of his skin, the deep color filled with melanin and sunlight, freckled in some places from days too long spent outside, worn in others from being rubbed in worry, hands calloused and feet rough. He had loved him in the black crown of curls adorning his head, royalty stolen from his father's land. He had loved him in the surprise that sounded in his laugh, the way he was always filled with a new joy in humor. He had loved him he had loved him he had loved him.

And before this he had wished that it had been this boy who had crowned him with the laurel of dust-shined leaves, that when he had looked up he had met this boy's kind eyes, not the sharp features of his father. But over time the sharp features had begun to blur. Achilles could not recall the race he had won, could not remember the sounds of beating feet or the cheers that followed or the smell of sweat hanging thick in the air. He could only remember walking up to receive his honor, and meeting the eyes of the boy who held it. He could remember perfectly the way his gaze had filled him, a fullness reaching his bones that did not let go until the boy's eyes averted too quickly.

_Pa-tro-clus._

He loved him in his name.

 

* * *

 

"Guess what I'm thinking about?" _You, always you._

"I don't know."

"Go on, guess."

"What we'll have for supper?"

"Well, I am now."

"What were you thinking about before?"

"I don't know, I can't remember now." _You, always you._ "All I can think about is supper." _I think of you._

 

* * *

 

Achilles' eyes had once held a green, bright as new leaves, dabbled with flecks of gold which sent shocks through Patroclus' veins. They were green with innocence of boyhood and gold with wealth of dreams built upon hope and promise. They had once glinted when he smiled, laughing of some joke he had told, or of some light jab he had made at one of the other boys, never with malice. Achilles was honest but not cruel, and Patroclus loved him for this.

Patroclus knew a boy that history would not have the privilege to remember. Patroclus knew the warmth of his laugh and the years with which it grew deeper. He knew the way he sighed as he turned during sleep, from his back to his side, from his left to his right. He knew the way he always seemed slightly shocked when he sneezed and his gold curls fell into his eyes. He knew how he moved his mouth around his vowels and never quite closed his lips at the ends of words. He knew every detail that could be memorized. He knew him he knew him he loved him.

No oracle or prophecy of his future could erase the boy of his past. Patroclus would confidently challenge the Fates to this and know himself to be the victor. Every god could hope for the glory in his future, Patroclus would hold the veracity of his lover in his memory and in his present. This was the irrefutable truth.

 

* * *

 

“Do you dream of life beyond Phthia?”

He considered the question, looking upon his friend with honest eyes he hoped would not betray how much he loved him.

“No, not without you by my side.” The answer was truthful. It would never cease to be truthful.

“What do you dream, then, for us together?”

“I dream of the sea and a place where winter chills but does not freeze. I dream of a fig tree in our reach and long days where we may never tire without desire to.”

They regarded each other and each felt a longing fill them that reached their bones.

“Prophecies promise otherwise.”

“And promises can be broken.”

 

* * *

 

Patroclus was watchful and ever-learning. Achilles caught unconscious smiles on Patroclus’ face while Chrion gave them lessons, saw his eyes narrow in concentration when he practiced what he was taught. Sometimes, distracted from whatever he busied himself with, Achilles would look up to see Patroclus observing him. Catching his eyes with a smile made Achilles feel full, pulling him into a small moment they shared again and again, just as new each time, just as filling.

There was a satisfaction that Achilles found in catching Patroclus with focused eyes, not regarding anything in particular, instead fixated on whatever he was thinking of, whatever ideas he was developing in silence. Achilles wondered what he thought of, wondered if he was reflecting upon what Chiron had said, in lessons or in passing, or if Patroclus saw the world around them and formed his own philosophies, or if the two played into one another as he considered consistency and contradiction.

Achilles wondered how Patroclus narrated the world to himself, how he viewed each event in their moments and how he remembered them after. Patroclus gave nothing away on his face but that he was lost in thought, gave no sign of judgement or approval. He enjoyed guessing, guessing what Patroclus thought about and what judgements he passed.

Achilles imagined if Patroclus was remembering lessons of medicine and surgery from Chiron, comparing them to the legends of the gods and curious of how they defied biology with sheer power, sheer force of will to live without the boundaries of mortality. Wondered if perhaps human structure prevented any possibility of immortality, no matter what the gods promised, wondered if Achilles could be cut open to discover ichor in his blood.

Achilles imagined if Patroclus was recalling their days in the palace at Phthia, comparing their lessons there with what Chiron taught them now. Or if he wondered of the disinherited boys and serving girls and what they did now, what they did that neither Achilles nor Patroclus would ever know.

Achilles imagined if Patroclus was spinning legends in his head, private timelines of victory to challenge those that had happened before them, if Patroclus played with hypotheticals and tested them on imaginary battlefields. Achilles wondered of the bravery Patroclus found in the privacy of his mind, wondered about the source of his playful challenges to Achilles, where his thoughts ended and his daring began.

Achilles knew Patroclus, knew the subtleties of his movements and the lilt of his accent, knew his favorite legends and the subjects which always sparked his questions. Achilles knew Patroclus in ways he did not know himself, but he loved Patroclus for all he had yet to learn of him, for all the new ways he would fall in love with him. Even in silence, Patroclus was spellbinding.

 

* * *

 

“What will come after us?”

“Men and women and love and war.”

“But what will be different?”

“Everything.”

“Do you want to see it?”

“I want to race you back to Chiron’s cave.”

 

* * *

 

Patroclus’ panic began with the movement of a king’s eyes, felt it rise from his gut and choke his throat, this overwhelming loss of control, the reminder of that inescapable prophecy. And as the dread began to shadow him, settle itself into a haunting presence, Patroclus preferred oblivion. He preferred the possibility of living the rest of his life in irrelevance, preferred that no one would remember Achilles’ name, preferred their story be forgotten, lost to the inevitable progression of time.

Patroclus thought perhaps oblivion was bearable in the face of fatal glory.

The bedroll absent of the warm of sleep, chilled by the morning air without a body to occupy it, holding only form and scent did not renew his panic. Nor did the sandals left on the stone floor chilled by the morning air, forgotten in favor of the freedom of bare feet. When the panic did grow, when it plagued Patroclus once more, it was worse than it had been at the thought of war. War felt small against the unnecessary separation brought upon them by a vengeful and bitter goddess.

As he watched the small island appear, the coast surfacing from unforgiving waves, Patroclus was struck with the thought that this island did not deserve Achilles. Achilles deserved the choice he was deprived of, again and again. Patroclus felt the same unimpressed disinterest with the games Deidameia played, the performance she put on. The more he learned of what had happened to Achilles, the more he felt that Achilles did not deserve such treatment, that what he had been given was a cruel punishment for a crime that had not been committed.

Deidameia’s grief of losing Achilles, her Pyrrha, was not the grief of a loss of love, it was desperation to cling to a created comfort, her answer to being denied such love. She created this comfort again with Patroclus, coping and mourning, then coping once more. Patroclus realized she would never find the satisfaction she desired, realized the life she lived was not one she asked for, but he loved Achilles more than he pitied her, and was glad to leave Scyros behind.

 

* * *

 

“Tell me how you love me.” It was a question repeated again and again from the both of them but the answer was always different, filled with new reasons each time they were spoken.

He traced a finger up the other man’s spine, over his shoulder as he turned onto his back, coming down to the crevice of his collarbone, kissing trails behind where he touched.

“I love you here, where your laughs fill your chest.”

He spread his palm and let it smooth over his abdomen, pushing gently where muscles shifted as he smiled and breathed and relaxed under his touch.

“I love you here, where you let me touch where you are vulnerable.”

He braced his hands on his rib cage and moved his lips down his body to meet his hips where they thrust slightly upwards to meet his mouth.

“I love you here, where you ache most for your skin to touch mine.”

He smiled, moving himself between his legs and brought himself parallel to his lover beneath him and let his lips hover over his mouth before moving to kiss his eyelids.

“I love you here, where you look at me and I know I am loved as well.”

 

* * *

 

_I will die,_ Achilles thinks. _And I will leave nothing but bloodshed as my legacy._ Each day he feels his life grow towards its close, filling it a bit more to its seams with each stab of his spear, every cheer of victory, every hollow war cry. In the raids he hurt an unarmed man, a casualty, as Agamemnon would say, no more than an animal. Yet when Achilles could not bring himself to tell of this event to Patroclus that night, safe in their tent, he felt as though the prophecy of his death had already been fulfilled. Achilles was no more, just Aristos Achaion, and though not telling Patroclus felt worse than a hundred stabbing lies, he could not bear to spoil the last of his humanity and Patroclus' hope. Small sacrifices.

 

* * *

 

“Sometimes I wonder what tongues speak our names now among the soldiers.”

“Agamemnon curses us in place of his greed.”

“Greed plagues all of us, that’s what this war is for.”

“Fighting over a woman poisoned by false love as if she were a trophy.”

“Perhaps they do not speak our names, perhaps they prefer to ostracize us from their memory the same way we have left them.”

“Do you feel guilt for leaving?”

“You know the answer to that.”

“And you know mine is different.”

“I prefer to be alone with you.”

“So do I, why did we leave Chiron?”

The question is passed over as if it was never spoken.

“He is alone now. I miss him.”

“Sometimes, when I have a question, my first impulse is to ask him, before I remember that I cannot.”

“I’m glad to have you.”

“Swear you’ll never leave me.”

“I swear it.”

 

* * *

 

His mourning cries echoed through the camp for days, until they grew dampened and deaf upon the ears of men accustomed to the sound. Achilles was a waterfall. His voice grew hoarse, his eyes dry, his stomach empty, but the pain he felt, first blunt and dull, slow and seeping, then sudden and stabbing and suffocating, it felt like nothing he had ever experienced before, not in all his years of war. Wounds could not match this pain, chronic and gripping, feeling it from the depth of his gut to the dizzied crown of his red-gold head. His skin prickled with loss and he could not breathe the way he once had.

Now he gasped for breath when he was not howling, but his screams still reached all in Ilion, and none slept, ears filled with screaming. They reached below the soil of the earth, down to the cavernous depths of the underworld, where Patroclus did not linger. They reached past the clouds of the night and into the stars, stirring the constellations to weep starlight in greater brightness than before. The sounds of his loss reached the Nereids, deep in underwater where no light reached. He felt as if his lungs could not fill, they felt like they were collapsing, failing. Nothing could fill the cavity that had ripped through his core.

The first night after the news of Patroclus' death, Achilles forgot what his body meant without the ache that filled him. He clutched the lyre Chiron had given him, pulled himself around it so that he would have feared its breaking if not for the single-minded mourning occupying every shadow of his mind. All he could wish for was the lyre of Patroclus' mother and the sweetness of his lover's smile as he played it. Was the lyre still in Phithia? Who held it now? He could not trace the grooves of the patterns on the wood, his fingers shook with every scream, he trembled so that he could not move. He sat with the lyre and the shroud covering Patroclus' body and he grieved.

Before Orpheus wept his lyrics for the Underworld, begging for Eurydice; before Pygmalion was overcome with the beauty of his own creation; before lyric poets spun verses of romance and heartbreak; before all of this, there was Achilles. The love he mourned did not pour from him as a font of artistic genius spurred by Muses. He was raw. His echoes of grief wore upon the ears of all the Greeks around him, brought the nymphs at the bottom of the sea to sympathetic tears.

History would remember Achilles for his feats of war, but the love he held for Patroclus was, too, unforgettable, painting bright colour on the marble statue of his legacy. Nothing would ever be more honest than the cries of his grief. The pitch of each scream wrought wounds in the memory of all who heard him. His repetitive weeping scarred the hearts of every soul who heard him. The fists with which he struck the earth bloomed bruises into the dirt and rock and sand and his very own flesh and the flesh of all those who walked where the reverberations could be felt.

And so Achilles mourned.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i can already tell that this fic is going to be a lot of me sending long texts to [my patrochilles partner in crime](http://rileybleus.tumblr.com), listening to emo af tsoa 8tracks mixes, rambling abt historical inaccuracies of tumblr headcanons while i search for inspiration, crying over graves' collection of greek myths, rereading lattimore’s translation of the iliad, and 2am journeys through wikipedia.
> 
> also i 100% wanted to quote [this](http://ovid.lib.virginia.edu/trans/Metamorph4.htm#478205189), but it matches the canon better than it matches my canon divergence. maybe i'll quote it later. who knows.
> 
> join me in ancient gay boy hell on [tumblr](http://wntcrsoldcr.tumblr.com).


	2. Envious Death

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ahahahaahahhah you know what’s difficult? condensing the last six books of the iliad into one chapter. that’s difficult. lmao i’m dead inside.
> 
> for the record, i’ve been writing the first set of chapters surrounded by all my research for my paper on the iliad which yea, i should be working on, but this is more fun. at least all my sources are being put to use.

Thetis ached. She felt her son’s grief seep and settle through her, felt how each moment without Patroclus that afflicted reality wore a pain into Achilles that she could not ignore. Thetis had despised him, the catalyst to Achilles’ impending fate, a fate she knew he now welcomed. Her hatred could not spoil how she now shared her son’s anguish, only granting him empathy when a mother’s instinct possessed her.  

She swore to still hate the dead man she traded her dignity for, but what was dignity to a goddess who had lost everything to the greed of a mortal?

Trades among gods were always something of a metaphor, a game of manipulation and subtle offence, a game Thetis no longer cared to play. She bared her bones and hoped they would be enough, hoped desperation and humiliation would be worthy of the life of a mortal. _Go to your knees before the Pantheon and hope your shame is worthy entertainment_.

 

* * *

  

“Achilles?” Patroclus’ voice was sore from disuse, slightly hoarse and faint in comparison to Achilles’ still-present sobs, filling the tent and never quite fading. Achilles turned to what had just previously been the corpse of his lover, now filling with life once more.

“Patroclus,” it came like a whisper, filled with awe and disbelief, all at once. _Pa-tro-clus_. He said his name like he had the first time and every time after that. He said his name with a quiet joy that didn’t dare change his fate. “Patroclus.” He said his name on a breath, he said his name with relief.

 

* * *

 

When Patroclus shuddered his first breath, his body warming back to what felt like life, he ceased to cast a shadow. Everyone knows that the dead don't cast shadows. For Patroclus, warm to the touch once more and heart beating blood through his veins, was still touched by the cold of death, it still gripped him where it had taken him. Achilles would touch his abdomen and feel a chill like ice. Achilles would look upon his lover and see a man removed from light, no evidence of his presence on the ground beneath him. Achilles held his most beloved companion and knew he was a breathing corpse. Nothing came without exception, there were no true favors from gods to men.

 

* * *

  

It was Briseis who was the first to see Patroclus when he first exited Achilles’ tent. She had been walking to clean Patroclus’ body, carrying a jug of water with her and a bundle of fabric. Both of these she dropped upon seeing Patroclus faintly illuminated by the dim evening light outside Achilles’ tent. He was still wrapped in his funeral shroud, pulling it around his shoulders despite the warmth of the thick coastal air.

She shouted his name, her Lyrnessian accent thick and desperation slurring the syllables of his name together. She said his name nothing like Achilles did, not in disinterest, but with a kind of love that was not expressed slowly, but all at once. And at this moment, her elation consumed her, tripping over herself to be sure that this was true, that this was Patroclus, not some specter or a phantom of her mind, a product of her anguish.

When she finally came to him, finally had him in her arms’ reach, she held his face between her hands, tracing his cheekbones, the lids of his eyes, up to his eyebrows, down again to the lobes of his ears.

“It’s you,” she murmured, unable to swallow the tears which now began to well in her eyes. “It’s you, it’s you, it’s really you.” She stepped back slightly to take in the sight of him, watched his chest closely as he breathed, saw how it rose and fell.

“Yes,” Patroclus replied, giving a small laugh on a catch of breath. “It is.” Achilles appeared behind Patroclus’ shoulder now, ducking out from the tent and offering a small smile to Briseis as he wrapped his arms around Patroclus. She stepped tentatively forward now, closing again the space she had just created, and brought her hands up, into Patroclus’ hair, gripped lower at his shoulder blades, clung to him as if she feared letting him go. As she pressed into him, her forehead knocked with Achilles’ and he gave the kind of shuddering laugh that betrayed previous tears, distress still stuck in his throat.

They stayed this way, holding one another, whispering faint disbelief and laughing together in broken versions of each other’s languages as if their mourning had not happened, as if it had appeared in some terrible hallucination, as if the memory of it would quickly fade as all dreams do.

Their return to camp was met with shouts, anger and confusion, relief at the sense of possible victory, a hope for the soldiers still left after their nine years at war.

“The best of the Myrmidons has returned!”

“A blessing from the gods!”

 “Was he ever really dead?”

“Calchas!” The last calling rang through the camp from Odysseus, who, after so long at war, was torn with power in his battle-scars. His voice sounded above the others’, ringing upon all ears, and bringing every other sound to silence. “Calchas, is the return of Achilles’ companion true? Is it a blessing from the gods?”

Calchas came forward, walking through the crowd of soldiers and slaves to the platform on which Odysseus stood.

“He is not a blessing, but a trade.” He spoke with measure, voice filled with careful intent.

“What do the gods expect?” A voice yelled, cutting through the silence. “A hecatomb?” Other voices came, murmurs of agreement and doubt, rising in the beginnings of chaos.

“Silence!” Odysseus called out, once again returning order to the uncertain Myrmidons. “Calchas?” His voice was lower, inviting a response.

“The trade has already been fulfilled,” Calchas replied. “However, this is not a blessing, the gods do not favor us. They grant us this trade and we should expect no more. This war will be fought and won without promised aid from the Pantheon. Do not rely on favors, the life of Patroclus is all they grant us.”

“What are we to do with a general’s lover?” A different voice this time, the disobedience was beginning to spread through the crowd.

“He fought for you, did he not?” It was now Menelaus who spoke. “He faced Hector, the finest of Troy’s soldiers. He fought so well that none knew his true identity until after he had given his life. Patroclus brings promise, he is Achilles’ equal.”

It was decided. Achilles would re-enter the war with Patroclus at his side, now named a general in the remaining army. Soldiers were split into new troops, reassigned roles as new plans were drawn. Hope settled in place of doubt and desperation, and the clamor of warriors already tasting victory returned to the camp once more.

 

* * *

 

This was the Bronze Age; the fourth age of humanity; the second patriarchal age. Many constellations did not yet dazzle the heavens, were still unknown to the sky. Gods and men still fought with Earth as their battleground. The men of this age were noble and brazen and their legends followed glory that the fifth age could never fulfill in the same way. Children of the Iron Age would hear of the Aristos Achaion and spend their lives in the shadow of this great war of men and gods and extraordinary creatures of nature. This war would become the legend of the bold.

What was most admirable was the heroism and bravery of the war and in the ages coming would be the most twisted, most diluted to be believable. Idolization forgets flaws found with bias. What could not be changed was the love held between the son of kings and the son of Titans. This love was not bold or brave, but selfish, beginning and ending in the desire to not be alone, for each to have his most beloved companion by his side. It would be enough to end a war stretching the length of nine years. Only the most selfish would win, for greed was the crux of this war, and would be its fate.

 

* * *

 

“Hector still lives.” These were the first words Achilles spoke to Thetis, standing in the waves, facing one another, the dark waters of Ilion’s coast crashing gently at their ankles, foaming slightly before returning to liquid form.

“As does your companion,” she replied, voice tired and worn. She did not sound like a goddess, she sounded like a mortal who had seen more than mortal eyes should bear. Achilles was not stirred by her voice, he pressed on.

“He does.” This would be all Thetis would receive in thanks. “He has no armor, nor do I. Hector wears the brazen armor he took from Patroclus, his disguise.”

“His death stands very close to him.” _Do not try to kill him_ , she did not say. _Do not meet your end._ She could warn him of all the glory he had already earned, she could tell him of the stories which would come after him, she could try to bribe him with a future with his lover, protected by the last she had, but she did not. Achilles fought this war as a result of her mistakes. This was all she said.

“Do not hold me back from the fight, though you love me.” Achilles answered her unspoken attempts of dissuasion. “You will not persuade me.”

Thetis bowed her head. “I will come to you as the sun rises, bringing splendid armor from the lord Hephaestus.”

“For the both of us?”

“For the both of you.”

 

* * *

 

When the rosy fingers of dawn appeared in the sky, Achilles stood in the newly illuminated water, watching his mother appear with the sun. The twin sets of armor she held glinted in the young morning light and cast gleaming reflections into the air, hitting the water again, and it shimmered.

She first presented her son with the bronze helmets, massive and covered in delicate but intricate carvings, ornamentation only possibly crafted by the hands of a god. Pliable tin that shone as if it were silver made the body of the sets of armor, light enough for movement and heavy enough for protection even against the most substantial of spears.

Finally, she gave him two shields, each with glittering triple rims, but this and their form was all they shared in similarity. Each shield illustrated a city, different in their citizens and how they occupied themselves, frozen in their metallic depictions.

The first shield showed a city in celebration. This city was engaged in an eternal festival, rejoicing in marriages, but engaging in quarrels as well, debating in marketplaces as flutes and lyres added to the silent clamor of the city. This was a city of wealth in both gold and liveliness. This was a place far from any war, far from the bloodshed at Troy, engaged in the life of any city, filled with varying shades of moral greys, but never to the point of warfare.

The second shield was nothing like the first. This was a city embroiled in war, even without a war to fight. Armed forces decorated this shield, training and in combat, ruled by counsels and led by both Ares and Pallas Athena. This city was only recognizable as such in parallel with its twin, covered in bloodshed and the preparation for it, decorated with wounds fresh and old, injuries in the making. This shield was covered in carnage, it was the embodiment of death and the confusion and chaos of the wars that caused it.

Achilles took the second shield for himself.

 

* * *

 

Dusk came and Achilles and Patroclus returned to their tent, now again both alive, living, breathing, warm. Warm but for the now-scarred skin raised on Patroclus’ abdomen, remnant of his death, cool to the touch, cold as death, a reminder of Thanatos’ ultimate claim.

Achilles, for all the time he had spent with lingering touches on any of Patroclus’ exposed skin since he had returned, now was tentative, reaching out to cup Patroclus’ face in his hands, breath shuddering slightly as his palm first brushed Patroclus’ cheek. Hands on Achilles’ hips, Patroclus pulled him in closer, kissing first the base of his neck, trailing his lips up his throat and to his jawline, to his cheekbones, leaving his lips for last, where he kissed gently, soft and slow, until Achilles opened his mouth in a quiet desperation, a starvation made by death, only now satisfied.

Patroclus gently led them down to the bedroll, letting Achilles’ back hit the soft cushion of it as his hands came up around Patroclus’ neck, grasping the curls of his hair and moaning softly into their kisses. Achilles pulled away for a moment, head resting completely on the bedroll, looking up at Patroclus, relearning each of his features and allowed himself a small, soft smile. He was alive, this was all that mattered.

Patroclus now kneeled above him, thighs bracing Achilles’ ribcage and hands tracing down his shoulders, chest, stomach, trailed down over his skin, feeling and touching him in the way he had ached to in death. He touched him with equal parts comfort and desire, reassuring him of his presence, grounding him as he kissed down Achilles’ abdomen, hands never breaking contact with Achilles’ skin. He let his fingers trace distracted patterns where he now held Achilles’ hands beside his head until he could no longer fully encircle his wrists and traced his hands down Achilles’ sides to grip his waist, and Achilles’ hands went to grip his hair once again. As Patroclus went to take him in his mouth, Achilles grip tightened, stopping him.

“Not yet,” he whispered, and Patroclus nodded, shifting to align his body with Achilles’ own, arms braced so that he could hover above Achilles. Achilles’ right hand came up to touch the nape of Patroclus’ neck above him, and he let his hand trail down Patroclus’ chest and then further down until his fingers came upon the cold of his scar, and his movement stopped abruptly, the grip on his neck tightening only slightly.

“This is my fault.” Achilles’ voice was slightly choked, his words let out on only a slight breath as his throat caught.

Patroclus did not respond at first, only dipping low to kiss comfort to his neck, just below his jawline. As he kissed him, Achilles moved his fingers over the scar until Patroclus responded.

“I’m here with you now,” Patroclus breathed between kisses. “I still love you. I’ll still be the reason, I’ll still be if you let me.”

Achilles moved so that he could bring his lips to Patroclus’ own and part them, moving tongues to teeth and sucking at his bottom lip. Achilles shifted so he was now above Patroclus, hands gripping his waist and shoulders, knees bracketing Patroclus. He let himself kiss lower down his midsection, bringing his knees further down and brushing his fingers over his skin. He kissed his hips and let his tongue run over his dark skin, the ridges of his bone, and the muscle just above.

Pressing open-mouthed kisses down the length of Patroclus’ hardened cock, he stopped his fingers at the scar and with his other hand gripped just above Patroclus’ elbow. When he took him in his mouth, he made sure to feel the cold under his fingers and the heat in his mouth, all at once, his ears humming with the sound of his name on Patroclus’ tongue, raspy and on shortened breaths. Achilles felt his blood rush further down his core as he developed a rhythm, steady and satisfying, evident in the small gasps Patroclus made each time Achilles reached his tip.

Just as Patroclus’ breathing contracted to the shortest bursts of breath, ragged and panting, hips raised from the bedroll to bring himself closer to Achilles, he moved his mouth off of him and Patroclus groaned in response, unable to form coherent words. Achilles’ heavily lidded eyes met Patroclus’ desirous gaze and he gave a teasing grin, lips wet, tasting of salt.

“Please,” Patroclus gasped, voice straining and eager.

Achilles sat up onto his knees, bringing Patroclus up with him, guiding him by the back of his neck until Patroclus repositioned himself to mirror Achilles, their thighs and chests inches apart, heartbeats thrumming. Achilles took a hand and wrapped it around Patroclus, moving his hand slowly up and down, thumb covering the tip and keeping his eyes locked to Patroclus’ as he did so. He brought his other hand up and placed his first two fingers into Patroclus’ mouth, letting him suck on them slightly before pulling them away and around to his backside. As Achilles slid his fingers into his own ass, Patroclus wet three of his own fingers and followed, gently replacing Achilles’ as he created a rhythm.

Their mouths met again, open and wet, soft moans escaping from parted lips as they felt each other, and they whispered promises to each other they forgot as soon as they were spoken, too overcome with pleasure to bother with memory. As Patroclus removed his fingers to replace them with his cock, Achilles shifted so that he laid down, back arched and knees slightly bent, his neck at the edge of the bedroll and his head on the floor of the tent. Patroclus held Achilles’ own cock and moved his hand along it in time with how he pushed himself in and nearly out of Achilles.

As Patroclus and Achilles both became more short of breath, Achilles bit slightly into Patroclus’ shoulder, and Patroclus moaned loudly in a blinding pleasure, hand moving faster so that moments later, Achilles followed. Patroclus’ abdomen became hot and wet with Achilles’ release, but he didn’t move to clean himself, still focused on the man beneath him. He kissed him again, soft and satisfied, tasting the salt of himself on his lover’s lips and he managed a final breathy moan before pulling Achilles up to him again, towards the head of the bedroll.

They lay together, tired and warm, tangled in sticky bedsheets, Achilles wrapped around Patroclus, their legs intertwined. As they fell asleep, the sound of waves crashing in the night not too far from where they lay, Patroclus pulled Achilles’ arms tighter around him and laced their fingers together against his chest.

“You’re always the reason,” Achilles whispered.

 

* * *

 

The sun rose and Achilles entered the war once again, now with Patroclus at his side. They fought past the ranks, focused on the best of the Trojan soldiers, determined to face Hector and have him be done. Achilles had wanted to face him the moment he had his newly minted armor strapped on, his impatience betraying him. He expected killing Hector to come with a kind of absolution, that he would be purified by the blood of the man who had slain Patroclus.

“Achilles,” Patroclus spoke, voice gentle, hands resting on Achilles’ own, hindering his preparation of his armor, hands shaking with anticipation. “Achilles,” he said again.

Achilles looked up from the straps on his breastplate to his lover, eyes still glinting with disbelief, wide and observing, waiting for Patroclus to leave him once more.

“Do not rush onto an empty battlefield, you have me back, now be sure I can keep you.” Achilles stopped with his armor, dropping his now-still hands and bringing them to clasp Patroclus’ neck and waist, both in comfort and as an anchor. Patroclus continued, “I have armor too, also wrought in the bellows of Hephaestus’ forge. Hector cannot kill the both of us, but your wrath has always been just as blinding to you as your pride, and I fear that if you face him alone you will die even if you succeed in your vengeance. Let me fight with you.”

So they waited as the battlefields filled once more, Greeks facing Trojans, war cries and screams of pain clamoring together as men raged and fought. They fought through the clashing of swords and spears and shields, searching for the familiar glint of the armor once claimed by Achilles, now worn by Hector in triumph. The Trojans had not yet heard of Patroclus’ return, none knew of the identity of the man whose armor matched Achilles’ own. They had their own enemies to fight, concern was not held in the momentarily irrelevant details.

They first saw Hector at the walls of Troy, waiting for them by the stone which still held against a near-decade of war. Even under his helmet, expression guarded by its metal, both Patroclus and Achilles could feel his cruel smile, certain of victory.

“Hector,” Achilles called to him. “I’m sure you thought that by killing Patroclus you would be safe, but you angered me, I have come to avenge him, and the dogs and the vultures shall feed and foully rip you.”

“Who is your companion?” Hector responded, ignoring Achilles’ taunts. Patroclus remained silent, only raising his sword in defense against no moving enemy.

Hector raised his own spear in response, and Achilles came forward, sword drawn and ready to strike. Patroclus, just behind him, held his shield forward and guarded Achilles’ side with his own sword. Hector lunged first, blocked then by Achilles’ violent shield and metal soon clashed, spears and shields parrying one another.

The fight changed its range again and again, one man moving back to throw his spear at his enemy, only to miss a fatal blow and come forward again to try and strike with a sword, close enough where each could feel angry breath labor under the other’s helmet. Many times, swords and spears struck the centers and edges of shields wrought heavy and wielded with force against one another.

Much of the fight stayed away from the stone of Troy’s wall, Hector pushing the fight forwards, further towards the battlefield, but there came a moment of weakness as he became overwhelmed, and his two opponents managed to bring him to the wall once more, cornering him. Hector had now recovered his strength, but in this position it was not enough, intensely though he fought. Backed against the stone wall, he could not escape the metal tips of neither Patroclus’ nor Achilles’ weapons. It now came down to which of them would strike the fatal blow upon Hector.

They slashed at his chest, just above his breastplate, then again, at his throat, hitting his jugular, cutting veins and crushing bone. They struck him again where his neck met his shoulder and then again, blades coming down to cut down from above his collarbones to below them, they cut deep above the clavicle, then shallow over its ridge, then cutting deep again down the chest, thick blood running down Hector’s now-undone breastplate, unable to clot.

“Please,” Hector gasped, struggling for breath, “take your armor, take its abundance of bronze and gold, but bring back my body home again, so that the Trojans may give me in death my rite of burning.”

Achilles held no mercy for the man at his feet. “I am here only to fulfill my wish that my spirit and fury would drive me to hack your meat away and eat it raw for all you have done to me. What comes after does not concern me. May your body rot in the brilliant sun on this battlefield, I would not care.”

“Your heart is iron,” Hector said, breaths laboring. He opened his mouth again to say more, to curse Achilles and his companion, but he could speak no more. His own blood betrayed his words as he bled from his neck and throat and collarbones, but still he lived, dying more slowly than he could bear.

Patroclus stood over him, breaths still heavy from the exhaustion of battle. Still his did not speak, but now removed his helmet, revealing his dark skin and yet darker hair to the dying man beneath him, whose eyes widened in shock at the sight of the once-dead Patroclus.

“The gods favored me,” and this was all Patroclus said.

 

* * *

 

Hector’s body did not stay by the wall, it did not stay in Troy, nor did it stay on the battlefields or ravaged rural Trojan towns. Achilles took Hector’s body back to the Myrmidon camp with hesitant help from Patroclus, covering it in dirt and mud and the blood of unknown men as he dragged it.

He left Hector’s corpse by the chariot outside their tent once they returned and did not touch it again, choosing instead to clean himself and his armor. Patroclus did not offer aid nor did he offer himself to be cleaned by his lover’s hands, choosing instead the silent help of Briseis restoring his armor after he had bathed himself. That night, they did not touch as they slept, curled away from each other on far sides of the bedroll.

 

* * *

 

Patroclus woke to an empty tent and found Achilles outside, looping lengths of strong ox-hide through the punctured tendons above Hector’s heels, the strips of leather pulled taught around slim bones and the other ends tied to the back of Achilles’ chariot.

“What are you doing?” Patroclus offered no greeting and his voice showed no sign of sleep, it was instead stern and perturbed by what he saw before him.

“I will drag Hector’s corpse through the streets of Troy,” came Achilles’ response, determined and completely without remorse. “I will let his body spoil before the eyes of those who praised him and have what is left of his blood smear the stones paving Ilion’s streets. Troy will know of its destruction before it burns, and the fate of Hector will be its blood-gift.”

Patroclus sucked in a deep breath before taking only a few long strides to Achilles and stopping his hands, steady before but now shaking under the contact with Patroclus’ skin.

“Stop,” Patroclus said firmly.

“I will have my revenge.” It was a petty excuse, but the only one Achilles could offer for his violent and desperate acts upon an already-dead man.

“Your revenge came when you carved open his throat. This is not revenge, this is wrath, and it will do no good.”

“He killed you.”

“And yet I stand before you now, do I not?”

Achilles now dropped the ox-hide he held and let Patroclus grip his hands, his whole body shaking, grounded only by the fingers tangled with his.

“He killed you,” Achilles repeated, feeling his eyes grow hot and wet as Patroclus pulled Achilles into a tight embrace. “He killed you.” He said this again and again, collapsing so that Patroclus sat holding him, his own tears filling his throat with silent sobs as they clung to one another.

When Achilles stopped shaking enough to stand, Patroclus led him around the corner where a jug of covered water stood. Patroclus washed the hands of his companion, cleaned them of dirt and blood and the stench of leather before bringing him back into the tent. Achilles followed him to their bedroll and let Patroclus wrap himself around him. They had stopped crying, but still they shook as they traced patterns with quivering fingers over pale and dark skin, still slightly damp from the cleansing water. It was this way that the two of them fell asleep once more in the early morning, holding each other in a reminder that they both still lived.

 

* * *

 

Patroclus greeted Briseis with her name and she looked up at him from where she worked beside the other women with a smile. She stood to follow him away from the company of others and they walked to the shore where they stood in ankle-deep waves.

“Hector’s body must be buried,” Patroclus said. “It must be returned to his family. His death is still unwept and his spirit cannot travel down the Styx to whatever fate awaits him.”

“Achilles will not do this.” It was a statement, not a question, and Patroclus nodded in response.

“I can convince him, but I still require your help bringing Hector’s body to Priam. Achilles will only seek to hinder me.”

“He does not deserve you.”

Patroclus ignored this, and a short silence fell between them.

“When will we bring his body to his father?” Briseis asked.

“Tomorrow night. I will have Achilles convinced by tomorrow night.”

 

* * *

 

The streets of Troy were almost silent, most of their men sleeping in camps outside the city’s walls, prepared for battle come the following day. Those unfit or disallowed from battle and those unable to aid their soldiers as war raged beyond the walls now slept in their homes. They felt the aid of immortal Hermes, guiding Patroclus as he drove the mule-pulled cart through the streets, covering them in a curtain of darkness and silence. And as they journeyed through the quiet city, Zeus visited Priam as he slept.

Dreams and prophecies had never been certain things, never vivid nor clear in the minds of mortals, words blurring into abstract difficult to grasp and even more difficult to convey. Only those most eloquent were believed by other mortals, untouched by divine messages and blessings. But Priam carried this message alone, waking from his dream and travelling through the palace to its gates, giving thankful greeting to the three strangers who now met him, offering him the body of his son.

“Achilles,” he said, voice worn with age and exhaustion. “Your father is like me, on the door-sill of old age, and all of those who dwell around him are afflicted by each emotion he bears; happiness, sorrow, and ire alike. I am sure that when he hears you still live, he is filled with gladness and hope to see your return. I have had fifty sons in my life, and many were broken on the strength of Ares, but it was you who killed my son with the help of your beloved companion while Hector fought in defense of his country. Remember your father and pity me as you return to me the body of my son, for though I am a king, I am also a father, and there is no grief such as the loss of one’s own child.”

Achilles, who had only begrudgingly taken this journey at the convincing of Patroclus, now bowed his head to the old and godlike king, offering silent condolences for the blood he had spilled just days before.

Priam now turned to Patroclus.

“Patroclus,” he said. “Your love and loyalty to this swift-footed warrior is admirable, through over nine years of war and a long history preceding them, following him both on and off the battlefields is uncontested by most companionships. You helped defend him as he fought so skilled a soldier as my son, faithful even in the face of such danger, and I would stand here too and beg of your return of my son’s body, but I know you to have resolved this already. Your sympathy comforts my grief, and your humility gives me hope for the future of the man you take for your lover.”

Patroclus took the old man’s hands in his own and offered a kisses upon their aged and leather-like skin, one for each hand.

Finally, he spoke to Briseis.

“Dear woman,” Priam offered, at a loss for her name. “You, living in the now-razed town of Lyrnessos, watched the first of the carnage in this great war, and for nine years you were enslaved. You know as I do the pain of watching your homeland be lost to the carnage of war, the mourning for your belonging. Yet you found kindness in the men who took you from your home and your livelihood, without turning your allegiance from the man you once knew as king. I will remember you eternally as a valiant Trojan woman.”

Briseis prostrated herself before him as he finished speaking, rising again to aid the moving of Hector’s body back to Priam’s possession, who kissed the eyelids of his son when he had him once more.

And so they turned to their journey back to their temporary home, now a decade old.

 

* * *

 

As the yellow robe of dawn cast warm light scattered over Troy, its people drove on their horses with clamor and lamentation to mourn the body now drawn by mules to his funeral pyre. As the people mourned the loss of their prince, they mourned too the lives lost without bodies to grieve before. The death of Hector weighed not only with his own life, but with the lives of the many other Trojan soldiers whose names would be forgotten with the deaths of those who knew them.

Cassandra, golden as Aphrodite and standing where she could see the mournful chariot, spoke to the people who gathered for the funeral of Hector.

“Come,” she called. “Men of Troy and Trojan women; look upon Hector if ever before you were joyful when you saw him come back, still alive, from battle; for he was a great joy to this city and its people.”

And as she addressed them, no person who heard her was left without sorrow, seeing before them a family filled with grief and immeasurable loss and the corpse of their greatest warrior, now slain and taken by Thanatos.

Andromache and Hecabe, wife and mother of the honored Hector, now followed the procession of his chariot and tore at their hair as they cried, standing, finally, before the gates of their fine palace, letting their grief be seen by all their people. They lamented as Hector’s body was laid on a carved bed and accompanied by a funerary chorus, singing dirges for their fallen prince.

Andromache spoke to the Trojan people of her husband, lost from her young in life and leaving a son, still just a baby, fatherless. She told them of her unhappiness, widow of the defender of her city and its innocent people now left without the best of their warriors. She grieved the fate she knew she would face without Hector and instead with the other women who would be taken to the hollows of the Greek ships for lands they did not love. She spoke finally of the vast loss of war, and the lives each soldier took when they fought.

Hecabe then addressed her people. Hector was the dearest of her sons, and, she told her people, dear to the gods as well, though he was not the only one of her sons whose life was taken by swift Achilles. The queen told her citizens of the fate endured by her sons captured and not slain, slaves, now, of distant lands. She told of the vengeance Achilles had exacted upon her son and how he still looked almost alive now, not unlike Apollo of the silver bow. As she spoke these words, she wept.

Helen called to the Trojan people last, the unwilling catalyst of the war. She spoke briefly, but she too spoke with tears, recalling the unfamiliar kindness of Hector among all she faced for the nine years in Troy, held by Paris and the poison of Eros. She felt double the length of the war in all she had endured, and mourned Hector at its end.

When dawn appeared in the sky once more, so did again the Trojan people gather, assembled before the pyre of Hector and extinguishing its fire with the best of their wine, gleaming and dark in the morning light. His white bones were now gathered into a golden casket by the hands of those who had loved him and this was wrapped in soft purple robing, placed finally in the hollow earth of his grave.  

Such was their burial of Hector, breaker of horses.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yES i stole the last line from the last line of the iliad and nO you can’t fight me. it’s a metaphor. to be fair the entire iliad is a metaphor but listen. imma do what i want.
> 
> suffer with me on tumblr


	3. Bloody and Oracular

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> teethonmydress: mo i think im turning into you  
>  teethonmydress: i just spent an hour reading up on proper pig terminology  
>  thedevilyouknownow: why??  
>  teethonmydress: bc mo puts sm research into every portion of her writing  
> 

Prylis had the idea of the horse, large and wooden, hollow but powerful, concealing enough of an army for slaughter and too wonderful to be unbelievable. It was appropriate that the grey-eyed goddess would inspire the son of the messenger to tell the Achaean troops of how they could secure their fate. It was carved with the most patient skill by Epeius, guided by Athena and creating such a masterful horse that, if not for its size and material, could fool many of its inanimate form.

Odysseus announced the plans, seizing both accreditation and praise from the soldiers as they prepared the inscription made in Athena’s honor upon the horse’s polished underside. The Greeks held the favor of the grey-eyed goddess and continued to pray to her as they burned their camps and packed their ships with all they had brought and all they had won. They knew victory still had yet to be earned, be it with piety or treachery, trickery or bravery.

The depth of dusk drew upon the Myrmidons as they made the last of their preparations, the best of them clambering into the deceptive gift, Achilles and Patroclus among them. They had, not too long before in the view of this great stretch of war, gone into the walls of Troy for a peaceful meeting, an exchange between mourners. Now, they went in war, not as three lone travelers but as an army seeking finality.

Achilles and Patroclus were last to enter the horse’s belly, Achilles climbing in first, leaning from the wooden trapdoor to offer Patroclus help in. Before Patroclus hoisted himself into the horse, he turned to Briseis, who regarded him with kind brown eyes and a soft smile. Pulling him closer, she kissed him low on his cheek, scratched by the beginnings of a beard as her lips grazed him.

“Please don’t die again,” her words caught slightly as she spoke, her eyes pricked with tears. “I couldn’t bear it.”

“I do not think the gods would so easily undo their work,” Patroclus smiled at her.

“Then be certain you will not disgrace them.”

Patroclus didn’t reply, only pulled her into a tight embrace, crushing her to his armor and pressing his lips to the black crown of her head. She was short enough that the top of her head did not reach his chest, and as he held her, she brought herself up onto her toes and clutched him around his waist, only releasing him once he began to let her go. She looked up at him, eyes now dry, and nodded curtly before he turned around and followed Achilles into the belly of the horse.

The deception of a horse was pushed just to the entrance of the wall and left, in the dark of night, to be found and to catalyze the fate of Troy. The burnt camps would maintain the illusion and the silence of the soldiers inside would be what allowed the siege to be struck.

Through the night, Achilles and Patroclus sat pressed to one another, held in darkness among the others around them, men who they had fought beside in battle and fought with in the camps. From their place of secrecy, the two dozen men were kept blind but never unaware, holding bated breath for the fate that awaited them and the city just beyond, hearing all the controversy surrounding the great wooden offering. The silent anticipation of the best Myrmidon soldiers was not noteworthy to history, was not memorable or eventful, and would not be relayed by poets or scholars, would not be considered in the retellings of this war.  

As the sounds of argument bled through the wooden walls, Achilles and Patroclus held one another, unseen by the other men, unseen by each other, guided by touch alone, an intimate reassurance. They silently learned each other’s forms as if these would be the only memories they would be allowed should they be claimed by the Underworld. Unlikely though they knew it would be in a siege, it had become a ritual, a necessity before returning to the battlefields of war once more. They had been foolish to think themselves better than death, they knew this now. Thanatos would not be kept wanting.

 

* * *

 

Screaming filled Patroclus’ ears.

Dawn had come and gone, washing light over the bloody siege upon Troy, hours and hours before. Patroclus swore he could still hear that first scream ringing in his ears, an inhuman plea for help from a mouth deceased and forgotten, lost among the hundreds of other cries and bodies. He was not sure how many he had wounded or killed, he only knew he preferred not to think of it. War had been easier when the enemy was another soldier, bloodthirsty as the man who fought him. This was not war, it was a cruel and unsatisfied slaughter, vicious and unending. There were no casualties, for now the Greeks had sentenced even the innocent to die.

Achilles fought and killed beside Patroclus, claiming lives he had never wanted to see Achilles take. It occurred to Patroclus that Achilles had slaughtered innocent people in siege before, that he had slain Briseis’ family before her eyes. Patroclus had known this before, he had always known, but now this unavoidable truth filled him as he watched what he had only known in the abstract. Yet watching Achilles fight and kill, Patroclus refused to see him as the weapon he was told Achilles was. This was not Achilles, this was some manifestation of cruelty overtaking Achilles’ every movement. Patroclus held onto this.

Among the death and slaughter, Achilles pushed ahead, driven by the adrenaline of a fight already won. Few fought back, even fewer lived beyond the single stab of a spear or sword. Other Greek soldiers took a cruel pleasure in the siege, found satisfaction in mindless murder and pillaging. They yelled of victory and took Troy as their own, a city taken in a woman’s name. Every strike of Achilles’ sword was meant to draw him to the palace beyond the burning streets, until finally, Patroclus could no longer see him, losing him to the rage and excitement of the siege.

Patroclus’ head spun, the sounds of fighting reduced to a din in his ears. Under his armor, he felt the way his skin coated with blood, warm and sticking, discerned from sweat by color alone. He could feel no wounds, only the desperate throbbing of his heart, rushed with panic, unable to find Achilles. He stood in the middle of the chaos of war, felt the press of heat from houses lit aflame and his nose filled with the smell of bronze from his helmet and salt from all the blood. Before him stood a temple to Athena, untouched and hardly seen among the turmoil, despite the cries of _olulu ololu_ that echoed from the streets into its chambers.

His vision filled with sights from his memory, filled with the flash of glazed eyes and pooling blood on dark stone. Standing among war and madness, unnecessary bloodlust and the war cries of soldiers unprovoked, Patroclus felt himself impure, felt the weight of one life heavier than any others he carried upon his shoulders. Among the bloodshed, standing dizzy with shame, Patroclus looked upon the temple and felt its divinity- pulsating and alive. Drawing closer to it, he could hear screams echoing from inside, an abandoned darkness that hid the brutality it contained.

 _Purify yourself in the blood of a man unworthy with violence._ He shook with these words, words of a goddess without any mouth to speak them, attached with grey eyes and a grim visage that knew wars wearier than the one Patroclus fought now. He trembled in her unseen presence and brought himself forward. He didn’t feel the weight of his body or the blood on his skin nor the blood in his veins. He could not hear the screams of the siege and did not feel the burn of his armor in the hot midmorning sunlight. He did not feel the cool shade of the temple as he stepped past its pillars. He felt no mortal sensations. He felt like a god.

Inside, the screaming only grew louder, almost unbearable in its volume, something desperate and animal, weak under the harsh swearing that shouted over it, crass and ruthless. Both voices echoed, magnifying and filling the dark and damp air, falling upon Patroclus’ ears and ending like static, too loud to be properly defined. Still, he recognized the voice that swore, knew the man to which it belonged before he saw his form, baring down over the young woman beneath him, kicking and screaming, grasping at the altar behind her, praying for some kind of justice.

“Ajax,” the word left Patroclus’ throat, low and commanding, quieter than either of the others’, but still they ceased to yell. Ajax looked up from where he stood, letting his sword drop from the girl’s throat, who silently whimpered and sucked breaths as if she had not anticipated being able to again. Patroclus recognized the woman as Cassandra, younger sister to Hector, a self-proclaimed seer believed by no one.

“Patroclus,” Ajax responded, the swift warrior now moving away from Cassandra, tone tipping towards a snarl. He brought his sword up to Patroclus, glinting in the sunlight slanting in from cracks in the cement that formed the temple walls. The light shifted lower as he turned his sword and Patroclus saw Ajax’s cock, heavy and swelling, hanging under his armor. Cassandra was grasping desperately for her ripped garments, flinching each time her wounds ripped more, coating her inner thighs with more blood.

Patroclus felt, once again, the whispers of Athena in his head, ringing over and over with indistinct words and vivid anger, a desire for vengeance. He felt memories pulled in his mind to the forefront of his thoughts, head filling with Briseis and the women she took as friends, the fear they held when brought to the camps and the coaxing it took her for them to begin to speak again. He suddenly hated Achilles, hated all the men who took some twisted pleasure in the chaos and destruction they wrought when they pillaged. His anger was organic, it was his own, but he felt it magnified with divinity. He brought his sword across Ajax’s abdomen, then again lower, severing his length from his body, barely hearing the scream it brought from the man’s lips.

Blood pooled as he collapsed in pain, and Patroclus slipped on it as he helped Cassandra to her feet, allowing her to lean on him while they made their way from the temple. She kicked at Ajax as they passed him, bracing herself on Patroclus’ shoulder, her foot making contact with his wound, bringing out another curse and a snarl from him, but he had no response besides that, curling in on himself as they left.

As the pair crossed the temple’s entrance and the late morning light hit them, Patroclus turned to see Cassandra whisper a thanks to Athena.

 

* * *

 

Achilles had never once been struck, his armor unnecessary, no wounds scathing his skin and no worry of blood loss from his veins. It would be said, in thousands of year’s time, that his skin had been coated in the protection of the newly deceased, irony being the barrier between himself and war. It would be said he held only one weakness, but had Achilles left himself uncovered, he still would have been the greatest warrior. He was an unbelievable creature, shrouded in time and myth, becoming something he never was in the mouths of humanity’s descendants.

He had left Patroclus in his ambition, racing to the palace that held his promise of exaltation. He screamed for Helen, he cursed Aphrodite, he ran, searching for the woman who was the cause of this decade-long war. He was desperate in his desire for an end, for the confirmation of his glory. His voice grew hoarse and this throat raw and still he yelled and cursed and shouted, unable to hear himself, feeling only the movement of his chapped lips straining over his teeth.

Along the road to the palace, the path widened and split, the second one narrower and still littered with small pools of libations, sticky and staining the grey stone. He saw, just beyond the horizon of the yawning hill, the roof of the tomb still smelling of smoke from weeks before, the memory of incense still burning in Hector’s honor. He ran faster still, feet now bare, the calloused soles of his feet hitting the hot stone harder with each step.

Achilles knew, in the only clear corner of his mind not consumed by battle-rage, that Helen would not be found here, would not be found in the tomb of a kind man now over a month dead, but still he ran. He threw himself past the doors of the tomb, bringing himself lower beneath the earth as he searched desperately for a prize he did not yet know. The air inside was damp and thick, humidity clinging to his skin, now cool only with the memory of a breeze. The depths of the tomb grew ever darker, and it consumed him.

In the suffocation of the tomb’s silence, all sound became magnified, and the sound of Achilles’ own breathing filled his ears, his footsteps falling in deafening impact. In the blind darkness, he soon heard muffled whimpering join the sound of his breaths, obvious in the traitorous quiet of the tomb.

The source of the noise sat folded in on herself, curled beside Hector’s fresh tomb and wrapped in dark garments that obscured both face and form. As Achilles approached, she looked up at him, tears and grime staining her royal cheeks, fierce anger burning in her fearful eyes. Achilles nearly flinched under Andromache’s glare.

Instead, he held her gaze, and began to give her commands, feeling as savage satisfaction rise in him at his control over this once powerful woman. He demanded she rise, that she prostrate herself before him. Stiffly, she knelt, and he demanded she reveal what she was hiding beneath her garments.

The child was small, less than a year in age, not yet old enough to have memory, too young to understand a war so ruthless as the one which now came to its end. Yet when his mother unwrapped him from her breast, the child did not move aside from the rolling of his neck no longer supported by Andromeda’s loving grip. His round cheeks held no breath, his small chest still, his complexion already paled with the greed of death.

He had suffocated beneath layers of soft and bright cloth, his breath seized by his mother, now caught as breathless as he with the sight of what she had done. She began to mumble his name, inaudible but desperate enough for Achilles to know it was the name of her son. She whispered it, again and again, rasping and frenzied, soon choked with tears to know that she herself had killed her own son. Achilles stood motionless, watching a kind of pain he was unable to imagine, a kind of pain too terrible to sound. To Achilles, there was only silence, even as he watched Andromache fill the tomb with mounting screams, and he could not bear to see the child’s body any longer.

“Leave the child,” Achilles demanded, and as he spoke, he heard not his voice but Andromache’s voice drowning in grief.

“Astyanax,” she still repeated his name. “Astyanax.” She clutched him now, crushed to her chest with such force Achilles feared he would watch the baby’s bones break. As Achilles was deaf to her screams before, Andromache was deaf to Achilles’ commands now. In desperation, filled with weakness and secondary grief, Achilles tore the child’s body from her grasp, leaving it atop his father’s tomb and pulling his mother away before she could object.

Achilles gripped her struggling form, held fast as she kicked at him, shouting in his ear and biting his armor as he carried her through the tomb. She screamed her son’s name and fought desperately to get back to him, but Achilles, trained in war and blessed with ichor, held fast and without effort. The strangled sounds of grief Achilles heard now were nothing like his mourning of Patroclus. This was more desperate, filling his ears with what sounded like death itself. He had never known the loss of a child, and as he held Andromache to him as he left the tomb, he knew he did not wish to know such a terrible thing as this.

 

* * *

 

Troy now burned in the name of hostile Athena, favouring the Myrmidons only as an alternative, much like cruel Juno, who watched the carnage below her. Anger boiled as she watched Aeneas escape, destined to found a new line, continue the legacy of Ilion in new lands sharing the same sea. This was a beginning as well as an end. It was the end of Troy, the end of legacies, the closing of the greatest book of the Bronze Age, making way for the tales of Odysseus, of Aeneas and Rome and the rise and fall of the great empires to come. What would follow would be a metamorphosis, dramatic reinactments of all that now raged, choral accompaniments inadequate for the voice of the dying populace.

Iliou Persis, the sack of Troy, all that would be remembered by many of the ten year war in the millenia to come. Ferocity would mellow to the spark of carnal desire as this generation of humanity and the unspeakable acts of the final seige would be regarded with a kind of alien awe and terror only possible for events so far removed in history without a living soul to remember them. Troy would fade into Hisarlik, become an oddity of ruins, a city lost to the beauty of one woman, taken without the privilege of choice.

But now Helen fled, and was caught with the sight of her sister in marriage supported by a man meant to be screaming war cries and leaving destruction in his wake. But he did not look like he had seen much in the way of battle. His deep brown skin was without scars, and his dark eyes held only concern for the sights before him. He held Cassandra against him like he had no concept of nationality, no understanding of hatred based upon birthright. Yet he wore armor to protect every soft part of him, helmet hung on his spear, unused by his side. Helen watched this kindness, struck by its contrast beside the siege that still raged, despite the flames of sunset behind the view of spectacular Troy adorned in flames to match.

As she watched this man, she remembered the description kind Priam gave of Patroclus, gentle lover of fierce Achilles, favoured by the Pantheon, and the sole error of death. She knew him by his benevolence, by the prosperity on his divine shield, knew that he did nothing for reward, and she wished, if not for the man he took in daily embrace, that she could seek safety in him. She wished for comfort in the arms of any compassion, and she wished to be Cassandra as she heard Deiphobus call her name from a location she did not know.

She watched Deiphobus appear, yelling the name of his unwilling wife, and she could not bear his godlike form, ruling as if he were Hades, seeing her only as desideratum, ignoring her own needs as foolish, and a rage began to burn. In the next centuries, in the perpetuation of Troy’s legacy, stories would be told of Leda, mortal mother of divine children, hatched from twin eggs and so beautiful it was hardly believed that any of what ran through their veins did not come from a god. But when Helen was first taken, she knew of the whispers that had travelled across the Mediterranean. People could not believe the stupidity of the Trojan royals, using the favour of a goddess to take the daughter of Nemesis herself against her will. For Leda was little more than a wetnurse for two divine children, far too beautiful and influential for any drop of mortality.

A desire for revenge burned in her now, taking hold of her as if she were her possessed by her mother and the larger Deiphobus’ form became on the horizon, still the more wrathful Helen grew. It was not enough that this city burned, not enough that Paris had been long slain. She watched the fleeing Trojans, innocent and guilty, and wished them all dead. She saw the Greek men, doing to the women of Ilion what had been done to her, taking them as mere prizes to evidence their victory. She wished them to know her pain.

Helen, daughter of thunder and vengeance, queen of Sparta and catalyst of war, wished to embrace her power now and hold battle with gods. She felt a thirst for ambrosia, her palms itched to hold a weapon, she began to scream, voice cursing the greed of Venus. Helen embraced her divinity and knew it was enough to strike any man dead.

Deiphobus stopped, Patroclus turned towards her, and the siege seemed to freeze under her anger, only the flames moving in this wretched tableau. Her torn and scorched robes seemed to be armor, her voice seemed its own weapon, and Deiphobus ceased, too fearful to touch her.

 

* * *

 

_Let mortality chain you no longer, break from your fetter and embrace your divinity. The milk of your mortal nursemaid filled you with deception, fed you with honey rather than ambrosia, raised you to be a queen, not a goddess. I can tolerate this no longer. Avenge yourself, for you hold this power._

Helen listened now only to the commandments of her mother, at the foot of Mount Ida and surrounded by vice and crime and those who dared anger the Pantheon.

 

* * *

 

Achilles heard the screams of a goddess scorned, louder than the grieving pounding like blood in his ears. It was powerful and shrill and made him wish to be deaf. Achilles still dragged Andromache by his side, her arms and legs now bound, stumbling in the outer streets of Troy, long deserted and cold without life to fill it. Beyond, the two could see Troy burn, could see Troy’s walls crumble under the animal weight of war.

The Rivers Skamandros and Simios were tinged red and too dense with the deceased to reflect the celestial Ida any longer. There was no water for throats parched with shouts long gone, no water to clean oneself of the horrors of war. To bathe in these rivers would to be bathing in the blood of horses, strength and power long gone, lingering only on the surface of flesh as a new battle for sanity broiled under the skin.

Achilles continued to pull Andromache, still struggling against him, in search of cleaner water, walking deeper into the web of the dying city. He did not know where his ambition would lead him, but he knew he desired absolution, declaring it in his vice, with a widow as his witness. If he could not find absolution in water, he would find it in his lover. If he could not find his lover amid chaos, his lingering dissatisfaction would be well-deserved.

 

* * *

 

Cassandra saw the pair first, the only moving figures among Helen’s ceaseless howling. She turned and gasped and struggled from Patroclus’ loose grip, though he soon followed, not in pursuit of her, but in pursuit of the man walking towards him now.

All who moved toward Helen had been killed, all who had done Helen wrong had met the same fate. Deiphobus had met his end at the mercy of a stray arrow. Soldiers looting women as if they were prizes caught fire in the houses they pillaged, screaming as they watched their own flesh burn to reveal bone. Supporters of Paris now taking flight of the city were stopped by the falling of pillars and statues, crashing down onto them and fracturing their forms. Those who approached Helen crumpled upon their first step, unmoving and unbreathing.

Yet Achilles survived, blessed by his mother. Patroclus survived by the graces of the gods who had breathed life back into him. Cassandra survived in thanks for her suppliance to the grey eyed goddess. Andromache survived as an unwilling participant, bound just as Helen had been.

Cassandra pleaded for Achilles to let go of Andromache, a sight of pure desperation, violated and still bleeding and pale with exhaustion, but Achilles was deaf to her cries. He saw Patroclus only briefly, eyes instead locking with wrathful Helen, who moved towards him now with an impassioned intent that filled Achilles with fear. Yet when Helen reached him, pushing past both Patroclus and Cassandra, she only took up an abandoned sword to cut Andromache free, nothing more.

All watched as she spoke.

“I spare you your life, swift Achilles, not out of kindness nor mercy but because I despise you. You and my husband and the rest of the Myrmidons have waged this war without the desire to bring me safety but with the intention of restoring honor. You refused to fight when Agamemnon had taken Briseis from you, not out of concern for her wellbeing but because you felt dishonored by a man you saw as lesser. You may not take my sister as a prize, for she has lost so much already, and no woman should lose herself.

“I feel the anger of many gods raging and arguing amongst themselves in Olympus, far above Mount Ida, and I know that the coming journeys of many soldiers will be long and arduous. I do not care, let them all suffer, kept from their homes as I have been. Your lover has earned the favor of the gods, this much cannot be changed, but in the power of my mother I can still curse you, Pelides, to die in obscurity. Let the gods slander your name in the wake of this terrible war and may you never see Phthia again. May you never rejoice in the parades of victory held in the honor of the Myrmidons you have led.

“You will be left with nothing to call your own, no woman will answer to your call. You will supply them with a home because you have taken all they had. You will be left with nothing but shame and you will be the only one to remember any victory you had in this war.

“You, Achilles, created nothing but strife in your greed. The surviving Myrmidons will hate what you did to them in your pride. They will boast only of their accomplishments, deem your victories as their own, and you will be stripped of the ability to testify against them. The surviving Trojans will call you nothing but bloodthirsty and cruel, remember nothing but your crimes and embellish what you have done with such vivid detail you will never be redeemed.

“In this curse I become your master, and you will be my revenge. What I order, you will do. You may be the greatest warrior, but you are far from the greatest man. Your mother may be a nymph, but your father is a mortal whose pride led him to rape a goddess, and you are nothing more than the product of a crime. I am the daughter of gods, I am born of thunder and vengeance. I exude a beauty and influence that is enough to bring wind to a thousand sails, enough to be remembered long after you are forgotten.

“I am far more than you, Achilles, and though the past ten years have bound me, I intend to live the rest of my immortal days in freedom.”

And Achilles kneeled.

 

* * *

 

Patroclus felt merely pain as he regarded Achilles, for he saw now that he could no longer deny what Achilles had become. The boy who had once loved him without thought of malice had faded now into obscurity. The youth of green that had once flickered in Achilles’ eyes now disappeared, just as leaves darken and turn, fading in their brilliance against the nights now stretching longer as the year wears on. Achilles was no longer the boy who juggled figs in an effort to impress the boy he loved. Achilles no longer ached to play sweet tunes on a lyre passed down to Patroclus from dowry to dowry.

Achilles was, in many ways, just as Hector warned Patroclus he had become. He had become ruthless, and desperate for glory, searching out any chance to prove his strength, increase his worth. Being the greatest warrior was not enough, leading an army was not enough, he sought a greater legacy at every turn, and his hubris was now his downfall. It was clearest now, even as Achilles obeyed the wishes of this scorned goddess, even as he chased the tail of forgiveness, even as he made clear his attempts to become the boy he had once been. He was not this boy any longer, Pelides was gone and only Achaion remained.

He watched the hard line of Achilles’ jaw, made more clear by the unshaven beginnings of a beard, saw that his features no longer held the softness of youth but were now hardened, not only with age but with far more. His eyes no longer held any more glimmer of hope like he had as a boy. His curls seemed dim with the grime of battle, no longer golden and long faded into something darker. His skin was touched with the blood of nameless others, staining his tan skin red and deep brown as a reminder of the bloodshed he wrought. Nothing of Achilles held a reflection of who he had been, for war had changed him, as it changes all soldiers, shedding all of any innocence they had once held.

Achilles, hero of the Myrmidons, now kneeled before this goddess and accepted his fate. No matter what he had done as a soldier, his heroism would be overshadowed by his wrath and his greed.

 _Name one hero who was happy_.

Patroclus could not.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ahhhhh i know i promised i would this would be up in fuckin november of 2016 but my life is the biggest mess you’ve ever seen, so now it’s up in 2017. happy new year!!  
> really tho this fic has taken me a long ass time but it’s given me a goddamn purpose in life classics are something that’s always there for me even when i’m in my worst place and even tho this fic is p okay at best i feel like i’m sharing that stupid love with y’all and i’m really thankful for it. writing this sad angsty mess just makes me really happy.  
> so thank you for reading this awfully late chapter, even if you fucking hated it. thank you for kudos and comments and goddamn bookmarks i hope that when you saw this fic updated and thought “fuckin _finally_ ” you weren’t disappointed.  
> (also i was translating the aeneid at the same time i was working on this chapter and it took sO MUCH EFFORT _not_ to kill aeneas off out of pure frustration. but without aeneas there’s no rome, so he still lives and does his thing off-screen. ur welcome, aeneas)


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